NEW YORK — Former Vice President Al Gore laid out his prescription for an ailing and overheated planet Monday, urging a series of steps from freezing carbon dioxide emissions to revamping the auto industry, factories and farms.

Gore proposed a Carbon Neutral Mortgage Association (Connie Mae, to echo the familiar Fannie Mae), devoted to help homeowners retrofit and construct energy-efficient homes. And he urged creation of an electranet, which would let homeowners and business owners buy and sell surplus electricity.

This is not a political issue. This is a moral issue — it affects the survival of human civilization, Gore said in an hourlong speech at the New York University School of Law. Put simply, it is wrong to destroy the habitability of our planet and ruin the prospects of every generation that follows ours.

Gore was one of the nations first politicians to recognize and raise an alarm about the dangers of global warming. He produced a critically well-received documentary movie, An Inconvenient Truth, that chronicles his warnings that Earth is hurtling pell-mell toward a vastly warmer future.

Gores speech was in part an effort to move beyond jeremiads and put the emphasis on remedies.

He took a veiled shot at the Bush administration: The debate over solutions has been slow to begin in earnest … because some of our leaders still find it more convenient to deny the reality of the crisis. But he also saluted Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger of California for helping to push through sharp reductions in carbon emissions.

He noted that few politicians of any party are willing to step into the no politician zone of tough steps needed to address global warming.

Gore cautioned against looking for a silver bullet policy reform that would address global warming, a view that finds an echo with many scientists.

There are things that you can do today and in the midterms and things you to tend to in the long term, said Gavin Schmidt, a climate scientist at the Goddard NASA Institute of Space Studies. You have to think on all the scales at once, and even that will only help you avoid the worst scenarios.

A spokeswoman for the Presidents Council on Environmental Quality said Monday that the Bush administration has committed $29 billion to climate research and programs, and has reduced climate gas intensity. That is not, however, the same matter as reducing total carbon emissions, which continue to rise.